


What If

by SilverShortyyy



Category: Star Wars Episode VIII: The Last Jedi (2017), Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Angst and Feels, F/M, No happy endings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-16
Updated: 2017-12-16
Packaged: 2019-02-15 11:48:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,757
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13030416
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SilverShortyyy/pseuds/SilverShortyyy
Summary: What if, he thinks, you came with me?What if, she thinks,youcame withme?But the truth is, they were common ground on a fiery battlefield. And common ground always gets devoured by the flames.





	What If

**Author's Note:**

> Slight spoiler alert since this implies some things from TLJ. Also, can be confusing if you haven’t watched TLJ. Anyway, enjoy!

On nights like these, she feels him like he’s right there.

On nights like these, he nearly thinks she isn’t light years away.

During the day, she spends time with Poe and Finn and Rose, holding meetings with General Organa and rebuilding the Resistance. Allies are hard to come by, so they have to work harder every time, convincing whoever can be convinced and persuading whoever who can be persuaded. Even the slightest support is accepted: whether a single piece of bread from a child with defiant eyes or an entire fleet of ships from a powerful but honorable man. Other than helping out in the Resistance, Rey also takes time to regularly train herself with the lightsaber Luke left her. Leia is happy to watch over sometimes, having tips and tricks from the days that she watched Luke all those years ago.

Meanwhile, during the day Kylo grasps at the shadows and the piercing luminosity of red, barely seeing any light other than the lights in his ship. He holds meetings to command his troops, makes sure that he won’t be as clouded in his renewed goals as he was when he tried to strike down Luke Skywalker. (He tells himself anyone could have made that mistake. Then he tells himself he wouldn’t have if he’d only been paying attention.) He had finished speaking with all the generals and had briefed them of the new goal: to set a central governing body for the galaxy that didn’t rely on the Force or whatever other thing people thought of. They would go about educating people, teaching people what it meant to stand on their feet. Then, when the time is right, they would strike at the Resistance and he would have the girl’s head.

The latter, though, Kylo Ren couldn’t always say with the most conviction.

On most nights, though, they simply go to sleep. She sleeps with memories of the day replaying, sometimes having dreams that begin with C3PO getting told off by R2D2, or with Poe getting beaten by BB8 in a race to the Meeting Room. Sometimes she had dreams of Leia and Luke and Han and Chewie, all four of them on the Millenium Falcon while she watched them zoom through space on the Millenium Falcon.

Sometimes she had dreams of Leia tired. Just tired. For all the reasons and no reason at all. Then Leia would tell her to build a future for herself that didn’t mean fighting till the end. Leia would say it’s a purposeful life in youth, but as time goes by it becomes tiring. Tiring, not because it becomes a drag to fight; no, tiring because it starts to sound like an irritating broken record when another ship is reported down, with no survivors in the explosion.

Kylo sleeps with a rigid composure. He lets himself dream, but of the future he had grasped, of no more Dark and Light, of just existence, and everything existing with no definite goal or order. Simply existence. But existence with purpose. No actual purpose, but simply to be alive.

He wants to build a world where there was no dichotomy and no fanaticism. Just living beings and passions and existence, and basic ethics to keep people from killing each other on psychotic whims.

So he dreams of a free world, free and built from scratch. Anarchy, that which he was in, had to end. And from the rubble of anarchy he would build an era that served no Sith or Jedi Master, but an era that served itself.

Whatever future he dreams of, it was never definite like darkness and light.

But on nights like these, when neither of them feels reality as much as other nights, she would close her eyes and not feel the softness of her blankets, and he would let out a sigh after seeing a lighter cast than the brooding darkness he sees every day, and they’d know all they had to do was reach out and they’d feel skin right beside them.

But her bed is only enough for one, and he always sleeps alone.

On nights like these, they rarely fall asleep. They rest in the presence of the other, eyes closed and pinkies barely touching. It’s enough for comfort but not enough to step over the line. She set their boundaries when she refused to stand with him, at the precipice of anarchy, a total reset of the systems that had engaged war in the galaxies for far too long. She has a vision, bright and impenetrable, while his is just as bright and just as impenetrable but not as clear, not as definite, though free and open and new.

She would side with him, but he dreams of destruction.

He dreams of destruction leading to a better place. It’s a fair trade, especially after what the past few centuries had been able to bring.

She didn’t agree with the justification, though. She would, because it made sense, but everytime she sees Leia tired after another battle she’s reminded of losses and pain and the burden never getting lighter no matter what future is getting ensured. Especially for the one who sees things happen and knows there is no way around it.

But on nights like these, there are no Sith or Jedi or First Order, no Leia Organa-Solo or Luke Skywalker or Han Solo. There are no sides and no wars, just Rey and Kylo in bed with eyes closed.

Pinkies nearly touching.

Beds occupied and either person not alone

She would speak if there was anything to talk about.

He prefers to just know she was there.

She turns her head so that her left cheek would press against her pillow, and he turns his head so that his right cheek would rest against his cushions. Her eyes meets his, and his meets hers, but their expressions don’t change nor do they reach out to hold the other.

On nights like these, she wonders about a life with him if things were simpler. He would build her fantasies up with details like porgs (he knows she loves porgs) and she’d add in what planet they’d be in (he doesn’t like planets he’s been to so she makes up something completely different) or what clothes they’d wear on a regular basis (she usually made him wear something other than black and he’d don on her a quaint black dress). They’d play pretend with eyes open but the fantasy more real than dreams or reality. They’d never reach out or touch hands; he never slept with gloves on anymore but he’s earned to only touch the line.

But a line can only be prodded on for so long.

Like magnets, their pinkies move closer. Closer. Closer still though never touching. A hair’s breadth separates sparks yearning for touch, but they never touch, though tonight they wonder if that’s going to change, because on nights like these the world is a blank slate and destinies and plans don’t exist.

_What would happen if I touched you?_ She often thinks.

_What would happen if we pulled?_ He would ask back.

_Where would we go?_ She would wonder.

_Would we disappear?_ But the risks are too great and that would be running away.

Tonight, fate seems to be giving them the reins on a life they deemed impossible.

Is it worth it to give in?

Curiosity pulls their pinkies closer yet, and they think the unspoken vow is going to be broken tonight. Reality was never forgiving, and the pattern of life was as much of a menace as it was to have known your enemy’s soul once before and know it still now. Neither wanted to back away from the life they could build for everyone else: the future they could build for the galaxies.

But then there is the part of them who simply wondered and wanted to, even if for more than a while, walk away.

Rey feels his heat on her skin. Kylo could feel the ridges of her fingertips. Rey could nearly touch the nail of his finger and Kylo could already tell how long her nails are compared to his.

They could break time and space. Rip apart the fabric of existence. Create a Force so raw, the entire universe would implode and rip itself apart.

Their fingertips are puzzle pieces that would fit so well together if they could only touch.

“Rey!”

“Supreme Commander!”

They yank away. Rey is back on her single-occupant bed and Kylo is back on his Commander quarters.

She blinks away the fantasies, blinks away the dreams and curiosity. Maybe in another life, she thinks. Or another night. But she knows very well that they still won’t touch on any other one of their nights, because even if the stars tell them that their fingers are meant to interlock, they’d both prefer to cross lightsabers than to give the future of the galaxies up.

He gets up as she does, and he can still feel her there, though barely. He composes himself as she does, and while her eyes are bright, his are dark with a condescending frown.

She opens the door to Finn and he opens the door to Hux, and without knowing how, they know what chapter is about to open from the next words to be spoken.

“They’re here.”

She doesn’t have to make him let it go in her mind for him to numb their connection. His heart still beats beside hers, but it’s softer now, a little less prominent and a little less real.

“Let’s do this.” She rushes past the corridors with Finn, soon crossing paths with Poe and BB8, and Rose, until they meet with Leia in the hangar who gives Rey a look, as if she knows and understands and hopes for the best for Rey.

“Ready my ship. General, send the command for full force.” Kylo marches out of his quarters with purpose. He won’t force himself to forget whatever is between him and Rey. He’ll toss and turn it in his mind when he has the time. When he is preoccupied though, he will be wide awake and will fight.

They both know that this is their reality and those fantasized planets and homes and lives were just that.

What ifs.

But just as real as the forthcoming battle is the fact that if they push far enough, his fingers would be interlocked with hers as they both push on the lever and take flight.

**Author's Note:**

> Song Inspiration: Our July In The Rain by He Is We


End file.
